Israel – It’s past 10pm, but work has just begun for the group of vigilantes in a small white hatchback patrolling the streets of Pisgat Ze’ev — a Jewish settlement on the outskirts of east Jerusalem.
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As the car crawls through the nearly empty streets, the men peer out at couples. They say they are experts at spotting those that don’t “match”.
“Stop, right there. Stop the car. Is he an Arab? That dark guy . . . If they are both Jewish, keep the car moving!” yells out ‘David’, a 31-year-old Jewish settler who does not use his real name.
For more than a decade, David has considered it his unofficial job to patrol the streets looking for mixed Arab-Jewish couples. “We are protecting the Jewish people, our traditions, our heritage. Some people just get mixed up. We talk to them, explain why it’s important for Jews to be with Jews,” he said.
His group, which works with police, goes by several names, including Fire for Judaism, is composed of up to 45 men and funded by private donations. Members say they are fighting a “growing epidemic” of Arab-Jewish dating and spend as many hours as they can on patrol.
Similar groups have formed across the country, including in the southern Negev city of Beersheba, and northern port of Haifa. In Petah Tikva, a blue-collar city in the centre of Israel, the municipality has formed a unit to discourage Arab-Jewish relationships.
In Pisgat Ze’ev, the growing number of Arab-Jewish couples is seen as the result of more Jewish settlements in Arab east Jerusalem.
“The problem is always with Jewish girls dating Arab men. The Arab guy comes and buys them things, treats them well. They fall for it. They can’t see what they are doing,” says David.
Sarah, who asked not to use her real name, said it is men like David who are the problem, not her Arab boyfriend, Zadar. “I’m not stupid, or gullible or looking for trouble. I’m a Jewish girl who happened to meet a guy I like, who happens to be Arab. It’s my business. We have to go other places to go on dates, places where these guys won’t find us,” she said.
In Petah Tikva, municipal workers said they only sought out under-age Arab-Jewish couples when asked to intervene by parents. “This is not a racist thing. Statistically, these girls wind up in trouble. We try to step in before real harm can be done by talking to the teens, making social workers available to them. We never use force,” a spokesman said.
David says that he too, will not use force but on a recent night out, it became clear that he was prepared to do just about anything else. At the start of his patrol he caught sight of a “known problem couple”. It was a young woman, stepping into a vehicle that he said was full of Arab men.
A car chase ensued through the windy mountain roads before the vehicle got away. David took down a licence plate number and called in the incident to the police. “I am doing this for her own good. She doesn’t know what she is getting into. It’s not like these guys are offering her a future.”
Good. These guys are doing a huge mitzvah. If they save even one Jewish girl from intermarriage, their entire effort will be worth it.
This is excellent work.
Because harassing people is the way to get them to do what you want…
Pisgat Zeev is a settlement like Far Rockaway is a settlement of Manhattan. Why can’t the media learn to use the word ‘suburb’?
More people like this are needed to stop this madness!!!
Keep up the good work. It’s easier than having to save an abused Jewish woman and her children from her Arab husband several months later.
If only these girls knew what was in store for them once the “honeymoon” is over, they would not even approach an arab. Please keep up the good work and let us knew where to send donations to assist in your efforts.
As long as they use a passive mode of intervention and limit their efforts to verbal persausion this is fine. The first time they threaten or use force, they should be thrown into jail. This is a risky effort and requires really tight supervision since it is so easy to cross the line into coercion. They are not the parents of these girls and don’t have a right to intervene beyond what they say they are doing.
kol hakavod to this organization.
I go to israel more than twice a year for the past 6 years (im going for sukkos now which will be the 7 year b’h) and I use the same taxi driver every year. He lives in ramleh where they also have serios issues with jewish girls dating arab men, he says that his daughter has friends who have been involved with arab men and the arab man/boy will shower the girl with cash and gifts (many of these arabs are involved in prostitution and drugs so they have the cash) untill she “falls in love” and that’s when the trouble starts, the girl ends up hooked on heroin and becomes a prostitute for the arab or a drug courier, since they are hooked on the drug they aren’t going anywhere since their supplier is the said arab rachmana litzlan, this becomes a obvios viscios circle of drugs, abuse and violance. so kol hakavod to this organization which is trying to stop the problem before its too late.
a gut yur
How can we premote unity. its all bout racial pureness. very nazi germany. in my opinion its racist, but when u look at it from a religious point of view its ok. madness. btw I grew up orthodox and dating a muslim. can’t we just freakin all get along?
#15 , while I’m not sure about the methods of this group, I’d just like to point it that it’s difficult to promote unity while you’re getting beaten. It’s not about the “genetic purity” like the Nazis, it’s about protecting Jewish women from getting abused and destroyed. The facts are the facts; Arabs do not have Western standards of how to treat women. Btw, are you in Israel or the US?
I wish they could save all of these “Jewish women”, but the reality of it is that more than a few of them are more than traitorous to the Jewish people, rather they are utterly lost and cut off from their Jewish soul for eternity.
Sad, but true.
where do i sign up
The problem, even for the liberals out there, is what happens when the couple moves to Ramalla, and has Jewish children. The Palestinian culture is not like ours, they will sooner see the mother hurt or worse (G-d forbid) than let them return to Jewish life. By their rules, the children are Muslims and don’t have a choice. Don’t kid yourselves, the conditions are very difficult for a western woman in a place like Ramalla, I was once there with Arab boys who were dating Jewish girls. The families don’t mind at all, it is a mitzva by them.
“By their rules, the children are Muslims and don’t have a choice.” And by our set of rules they are jewish, who’s to say who’s right? They believe they are right just as strongly as we believe we’re right. Therein lies the big problem.
“That would be true but only to a certain extent. First of all it violates the Torah and secondly, statistics show that many Jewish girls that end up marrying Arab men are taken back to the man’s village and end up being abused and held against their will.”
As if this never happens when two Jews marry? please.